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The Republican Gazette welcomes Emails to the Editor and press releases. All submitted items must include the name and contact information for the author of the article, and all articles will only be published with the author's name included. Thank you for reading and participating in The Republican Gazette, another of West Virginia's most biased publications.A very quiet meeting was held Monday to unveil a plan to sell thousands of dollars of state highway equipment in anticipation of farming roadwork out on a contract basis, according to a source familiar with the meeting. The implication was that the work will be contracted to an individual with close ties to Gov. Joe Manchin.Those who attended the session were told not to discuss the upcoming change in policy, according to the source.The stated purpose of the meeting was to review the new "Core Maintenance Plan" for the state Department of Highways. Most state equipment will be sold by May 12, including all hydraulic excavators, grass mowers, tandem trucks, four-wheel-drive pickups, etc. After that, state workers will be relegated to small tasks like mowing brush, trash pickup, opening plugged culverts, and fixing potholes. But all major emergency work, pipe replacement, and other big-ticket items are to be done by contract. The source, who is familiar with the highway department, said, "All this is a major change, for the worst."The Republican Gazette, in response to many requests, this week added a new search engine feature that will allow readers to explore the site by typing in keywords or names. The new search engine is a feature of Google, the world's most-used internet search engine. The search feature on the top of the page is configured to specifically search only The Republican Gazette.Readers have often lamented the difficulty in finding past stories only through the page by page archive featured on the "past editions" link. The new feature provides quick access to all articles or pages that have appeared when a keyword, phrase or name is entered into the search bar.And, unlike most newspapers, archived items are all supplied free of charge, regardless of their age. As always, thank you for reading The Republican Gazette, another of West Virginia's most biased publications.
New Republican National Committee Chairman Mike Duncan will be in West Virginia Friday for the Cabell County Lincoln Day Dinner.In January, the RNC elected Mel Martinez as General Chairman, along with Duncan as the hands-on Chairman who actually oversees day to day operations of the committee.Duncan is a lontime national committee member from Kentucky who in recent years has been serving as the RNC's general counsel.